Changing Places with Stories

4th April 2013

It seems like everyone is talking about community-led regeneration in our towns.

In our experience, such collaborative approaches to changing places sound attractive, but there are real challenges in practice. Those with power are accustomed to leading and often struggle to step back. Those with no power may want to lead but lack experience and knowledge. Each side, uncertain in their role, can struggle with confidence and grow frustrated. It requires high levels of energy and resilience from everyone involved, and a genuine openness to inquiry and questioning.

We also notice that lots of people have stories about their regeneration work. They are often insightful accounts of the real highs, lows and everyday dilemmas of working together to make change happen. But stories don’t always get shared in ways that are helpful. Too often they are dismissed as anecdotal or subjective. In fact, stories often contain valuable nuggets of learning that can be lost too easily.

So we were delighted when the Scottish Government’s Housing and Regeneration Team gave us some funding to work alongside Cathy Sharp at Research for Real to produce and test an interactive story pack, that we have called Changing Places with Stories.

We see Changing Places with Stories as a resource for sharing information, embedding learning, and inspiring action.